The focus of our research is the 'machinery of government' and
its reform between October 1964 and the general election of 1992.'
The expression has long been used inside Whitehall to refer to the
allocation and reallocation of functions between departments'
(Pollitt 1984: 11). The expression should also include changes
in the internal structure of departments, the allocation of functions
within departments, and increasingly, the allocation of functions
to bodies other than ministerial departments, with the creation of
executive agencies and privatization of government bodies. This
discussion attempts to outline definitional issues involved in a
study of machinery of government change. It reviews the literature
that describes the variety of governmental organisations and their
structures. The discussion attempts to outline definitional issues
involved in a study of machinery of government change. It reviews
the literature that describes the variety of governmental organisations
and their structures. The discussion attempts to draw conclusions
about what is meant by the term 'function' in studying the machinery
of government and examines how government activities might be related
to departmental organization. It finally examines the processes
involved in machinery of government change, looking at the reasons
for change, the identity of key actors involved in reform processes,
and the methods and processes which enable machinery of government
changes to be made.

The Variety of Governmental Organizations:
Attempts at Classification

The history of writing in this area is characterised by a continuous
search for meaningful taxonomies of government organisations based on
a variety of defining characteristics. Most have looked at structures;
some have attempted to look at functions. There have been commentators
however who have doubted the very possibility of developing a
classification system for British governmental organisations. Wilding,
in reference to 'fringe' organisations, is of the opinion that 'it is not
possible to make true statements about them all; the impossibility lies
in their bewildering variety' and eschews taking on the 'mantle of a
latter-day Linnaeus' (Wilding 1982: 34). Hogwood has recently restated
this point: 'any attempt to define quangos by listing distinguishing
characteristics will break down, since some of these characteristics will
not apply to some quangos and some will be shared by other types of bodies.
We can talk of relative frequencies, but it is difficult to classify bodies
unambiguously by their characteristics' (Hogwood 1995: 209). What is more
important perhaps is 'the extent to which a range of bodies exhibit varying
combinations of characteristics with which we may be concerned, and what the
implications of these are for policy delivery and accountability'
(Hogwood 1995: 210).

A useful starting point when trying to bring order to large
number of government organizations is the distinction made by
Chester, between 'ministerial departments', 'local authorities'
and the 'rest' (Chester 1953). Here ministerial departments are
defined as 'a Minister of the Crown to whom powers have been
given either explicitly by name of his office or in the name
of a body which by convention or declaration is clearly
understood to mean that Minister'. A local authority is defined
as 'a council with its powers and duties confined to a local
area and elected by the electors of that area'. The third
category in his scheme is covered by 'any governmental
administrative body which has its own statutory powers and
responsibilities and is neither a Minister nor a local
authority is part of the 'rest'. It does not matter if
this includes a number of bodies which are in practice
completely or very nearly subordinate branches of a ministerial
department'.

Chester's second category of local authorities is relatively
uncontested in the literature. The main controversy surrounds
Chester's first and third categories.

Ministerial Departments

The search for a definition of a government department in
the British system of government is an elusive and difficult
one (Hood, Dunsire and Thompson 1978). Yet at the same time
departments remain a focus for research (Smith, Marsh and
Richards 1993). Hood and Dunsire's work attempted to identify
determinants which governed the pattern of departments,
although the 'contingencies' for which they searched did not
emerge from the research (Hood and Dunsire 1981). More
importantly, Hood et al drew attention to the lack of any
single definition of a 'central government agency' in Britain
for researchers to use as a basic unit of analysis. As they
pointed out:

...we came to realize that the question is a deep, indeed a
philosophical one, and that there is certainly no single and
all-encompassing definition of such agencies - only a variety
of lists of agencies called 'Departments', compiled for a
number of different purposes, with a high degree of mis-match.

The total number of departments at any one time differed
according to which listings were consulted. Various listings
gave different results. Different institutional definitions
of government departments are given in:

List produced by Property Services Agency of 'Allied Services Departments' and 'Repayment Departments'

Index of Hansard

Treasury Memorandum on the Supply Estimates

Audited accounts by Comptroller and Auditor General (about 50% counted as departments)

HM Ministers and Senior Staff in Public Departments

Departments under direct ministerial control listed in the List of Ministerial Responsibilities published since 1974

Hood and his colleagues distinguished between five-, four-
and three-star departments where five-star ratings referred
to departments that appeared on all listings, contrasted
with three-star departments which appeared on only a few or
one. Grant Jordan has taken part of the Hood terminology
but applied it in a different manner. Jordan comes up with
a different scheme based on ministerial control and
ministerial rank (Jordan 1995: 15-26):

Five-star departments:

Departments headed by a Secretary of State, or called, 'Cabinet-Minister-led departments'. The two might not necessarily be coterminous however. The Minister of Agriculture, although of Cabinet-rank is not a Secretary of State.

Certain bodies listed as departments are headed by bureaucrats and some have a specified relationship to the Secretary of State. The Board of Inland Revenue in this respect 'advised the Chancellor of the Exchequer on policy questions'.

Importantly, as Jordan stresses, 'the list of components
(in the scheme) changes from year to year as the margins
are drawn to suit a sort of common-sense demand that the
Cabinet be not larger than 22 rather than the fact that
there are real differences between smaller, lower profile,
departments and those of Cabinet status' (Jordan 1995: 24).
He also rightly draws attention to the blurred boundary
between these organisations defined as departments and those
listed in the Civil Service Yearbook as 'other organisations'.
The Advisory Conciliation and Arbitration Service for instance
is counted as an 'other organisation', yet it is staffed by
Civil Servants. This particular example draws attention
to the difficulties in defining what the outer boundaries
are of 'central government' itself. Dunleavy has set out
five possible criteria for defining the central state and
distinguishing between central state bodies (Dunleavy 1989: 259).

Agencies staffed by civil servants but not directly controlled by a Minister

Agencies directly controlled by a Minister but not staffed by civil servants

Agencies neither directly controlled not staff by civil servants.

His scheme excludes all quasi-non governmental organizations
as he defines them, all agencies being 'fully public sector
bodies, constituted by legislation or orders in council,
funded by the Exchequer, and subject to some measure of direct
parliamentary and ministerial control'. Categories A, B and
D make up Dunleavy's central state, that is, those agencies
and departments under some degree of direct ministerial control.

The concept of 'families' has recently been introduced into
the vocabulary of Public Administration as a more useful
unit of analysis (Hogwood 1995: 513). 'Families' have their
focus on main departments headed by ministers and include:

non-ministerial departments reporting to ministers, but for which ministers normally did not and do not have responsibility for detailed operational matters;

associated executive non-departmental public bodies;

other statutory bodies carrying out policy delivery;

other bodies carrying out statutory or other functions not recognised by government as public bodies, but functionally acting as though they were.

Hogwood identifies a range of 'family types',
differentiated by the extent to which the core of
the ministerial department is surrounded by executive
agencies that were previously non-ministerial departments
or not, or non-departmental public bodies. The range of
permutations include:

simple core-agency families;

families with cores but also other organizations;

families with few staff in agencies in the main department;

families with residues larger than core functions and with complex structures;

commercial operations 'designed to run an industry or public utility according to economic and commercial principles...'

social service corporations 'designed to carry out a particular social service on behalf of the Government'

supervisory public corporations having 'essentially administrative and supervisory functions'. They do not engage in commercial transactions either to fulfil their main objective or incidentally to the performance of a social service.

These types were later given the titles of 'managerial-economic',
'managerial-social', and 'regulatory-social' bodies (Street and
Griffith 1952: 271-275). Greaves put forward an earlier
classification based on the reasons why bodies were created.
As such there were four types of bodies: 'regional', e.g. the
many Port Authorities; 'quasi-judicial'. e.g. the Civil Service
Commission, the Import Duties Advisory Committee, and the
Electricity Commission; 'trusteeship' bodies (for the management
of property on behalf of others), e.g. the Charity
Commissioners; and 'administrative or managerial' (of a
national service), e.g. the National Coal Board
(Greaves 1947: 104ff). A later attempt by Hague, Mackenzie and
Barker was made to distinguish between 'governmental',
'quasi-governmental', 'quasi-non-governmental', and
'non-governmental' organisations (Hague, Mackenzie and
Barker 1975). The result and practical usefulness of this
typology was limited. Significant problems existed in
delimiting their categories. Anthony Barker, one of those
who claim to have originated the term 'quango', later called
it 'overused and uselessly vague'. (A glance at the OED will
show that the earliest uses found are American; and that it
is quite unclear whether the acronym stands for quasi
non-government(al) organization or for quasi-autonomous
national government organisation). Many 'fringe' bodies
are far from being 'non-governmental'.

Official attempts to classify bodies in this category
began with Gordon Bowen's survey commissioned by the Civil
Service Department in 1978. The survey was based upon a
questionnaire circulated to departments. Departments were
left to decide what constituted a fringe body. As such this
self-reporting was criticised for being an haphazard approach
to the subject (Chester 1979). Furthermore, Bowen's analysis
excluded bodies such as nationalised industries, tribunals,
judicial and quasi-judicial bodies, and also those bodies
responsible for health services which shared many of the
characteristics as other fringe bodies studies. The final
analysis revealed few defining characteristics shared between
all bodies. Bowen drew out a range of characteristics that
were found in the bodies he surveyed:

set up by Act of Parliament

probably non-Crown

financed by grants-in-aid

chairman appointed by a Minister

staff are non-civil servants, recruited and employed by the board or council of a fringe body

annual accounts submitted to the sponsoring Minister and laid before Parliament

annual report published

Out of 252 bodies surveyed, only thirty-three displayed
all seven characteristics highlighted by Bowen.

The later attempt by Sir Leo Pliatzky (1980) at
classifying 'fringe' bodies was as equally arbitrary.
Pliatzky suggested the term 'non-departmental public
body'. He distinguished between 'executive bodies',
'advisory bodies', 'tribunals' and 'other bodies'.
Pliatzky excluded from his study nationalised industries,
some other public corporations and NHS bodies. He
recognised the difficulties associated with producing
a robust typology of fringe bodies due to there being
'no legal definitions to determine what should go in
these lists or into some other category'. He identified
489 executive bodies, 1,561 advisory bodies and 67
tribunal systems reflecting the arbitrary nature of
systems of classification.

Official classifications of 'fringe' bodies differ at
the time of writing. Public Bodies 1995 follows Pliatzky's
distinction between executive bodies, advisory bodies,
tribunals and other bodies while including details of
nationalised industries and other commercial organisations,
certain public corporations, and NHS bodies. The annual
publication provides a working definition of a non-departmental
public body (the preferred term, which we use): 'an NDPB
is a body which has a role in the processes of national
government, but is not a government department or part of one,
and which accordingly operates to a greater or lesser extent
at arm's length from Ministers'. Yet at the same time, the
Government's own advice to Departments on NDPBs separates
out Royal Commissions under a separate heading (Cabinet
Office undated). This document reflects the difficulty
in establishing any agreed criteria upon which to classify
individual bodies. In describing the creation of NDPBs
the Guide hesitates in making anything other than
generalisations:

Advisory bodies are normally set up by administrative action.

Royal Commissions are set up under a Royal Warrant under the auspices of the relevant Secretary of State.

Tribunals are set up by statute, usually in the context of a wider legal framework establishing citizens' rights and obligations.

Executive, etc bodies are usually legally incorporated, by one of:

legislation

Royal Charter

registration under the Companies Act

Executive Agencies

Executive agencies have, with some exceptions,
been formed from activities carried out by ministerial
and non-ministerial Whitehall departments. Although not
legally distinct - agencies legally at least remain part
of the parent ministerial department in most cases
(exceptions exist like the Royal Mint which was an
institutionally-defined department in its own right
prior to receiving agency status) -many now exist as
trading funds in their own right, many have delegated
powers in the areas of personnel management and so in some
sense, they have developed organizational identities of
their own. The setting up of executive agencies has created
another set of analytical and classification problems.
Colloquially known as 'Next Steps' agencies after the title
of the report that proposed the setting up of executive
agencies, the terminology hides a high degree of variation
and complexity. Executive agencies vary in a range of ways.
Hogwood differentiates in terms of (Hogwood 1993: 5-9):

staff numbers;

status of chief executive and nature of appointment;

organizational origins: some agencies for instance were departments in their own rights prior to gaining agency status, some were separate units within departments, some were made up of units from two separate departments, some already had trading fund status, and some had previously been non-departmental bodies;

funding; gross-cost, net-cost or trading fund regimes

staffing: vary according to whether they employ civil servants and non-industrial and industrial civil servants;

existence of boards in agency structures;

monopoly status;

function and task: single or multiple.

He does not however attempt to produce a system of
classification. The Fraser Report attempted to classify
executive agencies primarily according to the role and
functions they carried out (Efficiency Unit 1991).
It distinguished between:

mainstream agencies: which are fundamental to the main policy orientation of the parent department e.g. the Employment Service;

regulatory and statutory agencies: execute statutory functions derived from the main aims of the parent department e.g. Vehicle Inspectorate;

peripheral agencies: not linked to the main aims of a department but report to a minister e.g. HMSO.

A later attempt was made by Greer (1992) to differentiate between agencies on the basis of:

financial regime: whether the agencies were self-financing or not and

market share: whether the agencies were monopoly providers.

But again, there is not attempt to produce a taxonomy.

In research on bureau-shaping models of bureaucratic
behaviour, as well as distinguishing between different
'types' of budgets, Dunleavy identified 5 main types of
bureaus and three additional categories, related to
particular configurations and ratios of a bureau's core,
bureau, programme, and super-programme budgets respectively
(Dunleavy 1985, 1989). In this sense, there is a
relationship between structure (the bureau's budget)
and function. Dunleavy's scheme, is however, more akin
to a typology, rather than mere taxonomy, in that it carries
with it an assumption that there are certain relationships
between concepts, constructs and variables. The main types
of agency identified are:

delivery

regulatory

transfer

contracts

control

taxing

trading

servicing

Government Functions

The Nature of Functions

Government organizations carry out and engage in a range of
activities, some derived from statutory powers, some not.
The notion of a government function is a particularly vague
and imprecise concept. What is perhaps less imprecise are
legally defined powers defined by legislation or prerogative
powers. Statutes confer powers on ministers individually and
executive power is consequently fragmented. Machinery of
government change often involves a reallocation of functions
between government bodies. One element of this might be the
reallocation of statutory powers. Functions and activities
carried out by government are often derived from a statutory
basis, although government will engage in activities which
are not directly related to any statutory provision. The
promotion of Citizen's Charters for instance by the Citizen's
Charter Unit has not been the product of legislative action.
Nevertheless, it is a function or activity of government,
which has the potential for transfer. Tracking statutory
powers might, in theory at least, be practicable but for the
lack of any documentary source which keeps a record of these
movements. No publication exists which indicates which
statutory powers are allocated to each individual minister,
either at a given point in time or over a particular period.

The Allocation of Functions

The first attempt to address the distribution of government
activities between government departments came from the
Haldane Report published in 1918. The Haldane Inquiry was
set up to 'enquire into the responsibilities of the various
Departments of the central executive Government, and to
advise in what manner the exercise and distribution by the
Government of its functions should be improved'
(Haldane 1918: 4). The Committee went on to ask, 'Upon what
principles are the functions of Departments to be determined
and allocated?' (Haldane 1918: 7). The Report proposed two
methods of allocating functions to departments and ministries:
first, the principle of allocating functions according to the
persons or classes to be dealt with and secondly, allocation
according to the services to be performed. The Report argued
against the first on the basis that it would be difficult to
limit the number of individual departments that would be
needed to cover all possibilities. Haldane favoured the
second principle and put forward a scheme along this lines.
The Report did acknowledge however that the drawing of
clearly delineated lines around a department's activities was
in practice an impossible task such was the need for
'co-operation between Departments in dealing with business of
common interest' (Haldane 1918: 16). The Report proposes ten
main divisions:

Finance

National Defence and External Affairs

National Defence and External Affairs

Research and Information

Production (including Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries), Transport and Commerce

Employment

Supplies

Education

Health

Justice

A later, American, attempt (Gulick 1937) to develop
principles for allocating government activities to individual
organizations suggested four criteria: purposes, processes
employed, clientele served and area served . Gulick's
examples are:

Purpose: such as furnishing water, controlling crime, or conducting education;

Administrative efficiency is supposed to be increased by
grouping workers according to (a) purpose, (b) process,
(c) clientele, or (d) place. But from the discussion of
specialization it is clear that this principle is internally
inconsistent; for purpose, process, clientele, and place are
competing bases of organization, and at any given point of
division the advantages of three must be sacrificed to secure
the advantages of the fourth.

Yet Hammond has demonstrated that Gulick was aware of the
limitations of his four-fold classification of methods of
departmentatlisation, recalling Gulick's comment reflecting
the 'impossibility of clearly dividing all the work of any
government into a few such major purposes which do not
overlap extensively' (Hammond 1990: 163).

Hogwood has taken Gulick's classification and analysed
contemporary government organisation against these
principles (Hogwood 1992: 65-167). There is currently
no government ministry or department organised according
to the principle of process employed in delivering policy.
Client group organization was used for example, in the
creation of the Ministry of Pensions and some others proposed
(e.g. Ministry for Women). The territory principle is used
in the cases of the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland
Offices. However, even within the Scottish Office, functions
are allocated according to other principles in the departmental
subdivisions. The allocation of activities according to
broad purpose or function served is perhaps more common.
Nevertheless, as Hogwood points out ( 1992: 166):

activities of government are very numerous and varied.
They do not all fall into convenient groupings. Even
when there are a number of groups of functions which seem
to be related, it is not always clear whether these should
be the responsibility of a number of small departments or
a single large one. Further, the concept of function has
inadequacies as a description of how policy responsibilities
are in fact allocated and also in the way in which the term
is sometimes used in discussions about proposed changes in
responsibility.

Self's view is that despite these criticisms, the process
principle is perhaps the most easily operationalised: 'If
there has to be one dominant principle of organisation, it
is not hard to show by elimination that major function or
purpose should be one. It is most intelligible, and conducive
to goal effectiveness, to base organisation upon output rather
than process, ends rather than means.' (Self 1972: 56-57).
Organizations may carry out particular functions, including
statutory ones, but the goals of these functions may be
numerous. In reality, departmental arrangements and allocation
of functions may combine several elements of the Gulick
classification. The British Ministry of Technology that
existed between 1964 and 1970 could be argued to have employed
three of the methods of departmentalisation - process, client
group and purpose.

The subject of the allocation of government functions to
organizational structures was revisited by the Committee
on The Reorganisation of Central Government under the Heath
Government in 1970. Geoffrey Rippon had called for a 'new
Haldane Committee' while in Opposition. The Report supported
the functional principle for the organisation of government
departments (Prime Minister/Minister for the Civil Service
1970):

the object has been to ensure that the broad framework of
the central machinery in terms of Ministerial and departmental
functions complies with the Government's strategic policy
objectives. In practical terms, this means the application
of the functional principle as the basis for the allocation
of responsibilities: government departments should be
organised by reference to the task to be done or the
objective to be attained, and this should be the basis of
the division of work between departments rather than, for
example, dividing responsibility between departments so that
each one deals with a client group.

The White Paper was however thin in its analysis and
justification of this approach for the basis of the
allocation of functions. As Johnson makes clear, while
Governments may find it practicable to allocate activities
functionally between departments the choice of organizational
design is dependent on a hierarchy of objectives (Johnson
1971: 5). Functions and 'function principles' are in
Johnsons's words, 'elusive terms'. Taking housing as a
function, Johnson notes that this might mean 'the maintenance
of satisfactory housing conditions in society'. But this
says little of specific tasks involved in achieving this
which may be various. This policy goal might be achieved
for instance by financial incentives through taxation and
the 'housing function' might then be best placed inside a
finance ministry.

Machinery of Government Reform

Reasons for Reform

An analysis of the motives behind machinery
of government changes produces a variety of
reasons for reforms. Pollitt has identified
six main reasons for creating new ministerial
deparmtents (and abolishing others), although
he gives more weight to some rathern than others
(Pollitt 1984: 128):

created to give extra weight to a given policy, or to mark a change of direction in an existing policy

created with an eye to giving a favourable public impression of dynamism and progressive reform

created to adapt to major changes in the environment beyond Westminster and Whitehall

created to ease the Prime Minister's problems in deploying and 'balancing the talents of his/her senior colleagues'

Salamon produced broadly similar conclusions, producing
a threefold classification of reasons for structural
reorganisation: economy and efficiency, policy effectiveness
and tactical political advantage (Salamon 1981: 485).

Actors in the Reform Process

Pollitt and others have shown that three key actors are
involved in machinery of government decisions. Decisions
result from informal deliberations between the Prime Minister,
the Head of the Civil Service, and the Cabinet Secretary
(although these last two posts have been combined since 1981)
- the 'triumvirate' (Pollitt 1984: 126). The Machinery of
Government Division of the Cabinet Office (more recently
OMCS, OPSS and OPS, although formerly a part of the Treasury),
has been involved in MG decisions to varying degrees over
time. MG Division Pollitt argues was consulted more regularly
when William Armstrong was Head of the Civil Service. Their
role was one of 'tidying up and adjustment' (Pollitt 1984: 131).
The Division when Bancroft and Caulcott headed it provided
significant briefing and support, and generally played a more
proactive part in MG decisions. The Treasury's role in MG
decisions has usually been in handling the transfer of funds
between departmental votes.

As far as affected ministers and permanent secretaries
are concerned, Pollitt suggests evidence that they often
have little notice of what changes are proposed. This is
confirmed in the case of the latest machinery of government
change involving the creation of the Department for Education
and Employment. Michael Bichard, permanent secretary of the
new department in a recent speech states clearly that 'No one,
including the two permanent secretaries (myself and Sir Tim
Lankester) and the secretaries of state (Michael Portillo
and Gillian Shephard) knew that the merger was to happen
until an hour before it was announced' (Bichard 1996: 22).
While therefore ministers and officials over the period have
been involved to different degrees in MG decisions, the
role of the Triumvirate is paramount and dictates the degree
of consultation with other groups. The role of Parliament
in MG decisions is similarly limited. Few debates have been
held on MG issues. Finally, pressure group influence on
MG decisions has also been modest.

Methods of Reform

Machinery of government reform in Britain presents one
particular example of what has been recently labelled,
'executive self-regulation' (Page 1995). Most modern
departments (and non-departmental public bodies) have
been established by statute. The current practice since
the 1975 Ministers of the Crown Act has been to transfer
functions to a new department by the exercise of the
prerogative, for instance in the creation of a new department
of state with new secretary of state. This tends to be
the case when there is a re-allocation of existing statutory
functions rather than the creation of new ones.

Until the 1946 Ministers of the Crown (Transfer of Functions)
Act, the transfer of powers between departments could only
be carried out by primary legislation (Lee 1977). The 1946
Act provided for the transfer of functions between offices
and departments by order subject to the negative resolution
procedure. Recent legislation has brought with it greater
flexibility in dealing with issues of function transfers.
The Deregulation and Contracting Out Act 1994 makes provision
for contracting out and transfer of certain functions defined
as eligible by ministerial order to the private sector.
Such ministerial orders are subject to the affirmative
resolution procedure.

There are a variety of ways in which machinery of government change occurs:

Formal dissolution and transfer of statutory functions to another department or departments

Pollitt suggests that this proceeds by Order in Council
subject to the affirmative resolution procedure (Pollitt
1984: 13). Some dissolutions however have proceeded
silently under the negative resolution procedure, by merger
(Department of Trade and Industry in 1983), by change of
style of minister or department (Department of Technical
Cooperation, Ministry of Technology and Civil Service
Department), or simple transfer of functions (DEA, DTI in
1974, Department of Prices and Consumer Protection).
In reality, the choice between negative and affirmative
resolution procedures is not clear cut, being determined
by drafting factors (MG Division). Dissolutions and
transfers of non-ministerial departments and other bodies
may be effected by or under an Act of Parliament rather
than Order in Council. For example, the War Damage Commission
was abolished and its residual functions transferred in
October 1964 by the War Damage Act 1964. The Deregulation
Act of 1994 has removed in part the necessity for primary
legislation or repeal of existing legislation for such
changes. Previously, governing statutes might provide
for a dissolution under delegated legislation (s.11 of
the Tithe Act 1951 which included the power to transfer
functions of the Tithe Redemption Commission to another
government department; the Commission was dissolved on
1st April 1960 and its functions transferred to the
Board of Inland Revenue). In cases where dissolutions
take place from a minister, department or other body
under ministerial control to a body outside central
government, transfers may take place outside of the 1946
and 1975 Ministers of the Crown Acts. Such was the case
in the transfer of functions from the Commissioners of
Customs and Excise to the Governor of the Isle of Man in
Council (SI 1980/399).

Transfer of statutory functions from one department to another

This occurs through a Transfer of Functions Order under the negative resolution procedure.

Transfer of non-statutory functions

As a rule, there is no need for the use of statutory
instruments in this case. the Ministers of the Crown
Acts 1946 and 1975 contained reservations that nothing
was to prejudice any power exercised by virtue of the
prerogative of the Crown. When statutory and prerogative
functions however are transferred together (e.g. Minister
for the Civil Service Order 1968) it has been found
convenient to use the affirmative resolution procedure
to transfer both. In this instance, if prerogative
powers are transferred by Transfer of Function Order,
all subsequent transfers of the same function must be
by TFO. The power of the prerogative is lost (Pollitt
1984: 13). There is also the possibility of transfer
of non-statutory functions by administrative action.

Cessation of statutory functions

Primary legislation is needed in this case in this case,
although there are apparently countless examples of
statutory functions falling into disuse and waiting
to be formally eliminated in revising legislation
(MG Division).

Cessation of non-statutory functions

No primary or secondary legislation in this case is needed

Creation of new government functions and bodies

Primary legislation is needed for new statutory functions.
Bodies however may be created administratively and then
subsequently become statutory as in the case of the
Commission on Industrial Relations (established 1969;
became statutory in 1971). Government functions may be
undertaken purely administratively. Certain functions
have also been created by administrative action pending
statutory authorisation. The Criminal Injuries Compensation
Board was set up in 1964 but not made statutory until
1988 under the Criminal Justice Act 1988 Part VII.

by administrative action (i.e. by action by ministers not under specific statutory powers and not in exercise of the prerogative powers of the Crown)

There is no need however under the Ministers of the Crown
Acts for primary legislation to be enacted for the
establishment of new departments under a new Secretary
of State. Both the DEA and Welsh Office for instance
were created under prerogative powers and therefore,
there was no necessity for a statutory instrument to
dissolve the DEA.

Transfer of functions between unnamed secretaries of state

Traditionally functions could be transferred between
the secretaries of state. The post of secretary of
state is a 'unified office' and therefore functions
are transferred without need for Transfer of Function
Orders.